Luiz F. Cótica, Guilherme M. Santos, Valdirlei F. Freitas, Adelino A. Coelho, Madhuparna Pal, Ivair A. Santos, Ducinei Garcia, José A. Eiras, Ruyan Guo e Amar S. Bhalla

Journal of Applied Physics – Volume: 117; Issue: 6; Number Article: 064104; DOI: 10.1063/1.4908016

It is still a challenging problem to obtain technologically useful materials displaying strong magnetoelectric coupling at room temperature. In the search for new effects and materials to achieve this kind of coupling, a nonlinear magnetoelectric effect was proposed in the magnetically disordered relaxor ferroelectric materials. In this context, the aluminum iron oxide (AlFeO3), a room temperature ferroelectric relaxor and magnetic spin glass compound, emerges as an attractive lead-free magnetoelectric material along with nonlinear magnetoelectric effects. In this work, static, dynamic, and temperature dependent ferroic and magnetoelectric properties in lead-free AlFeO3 and 2 at. % Nb-doped AlFeO3 multiferroic magnetoelectric compositions are studied. Pyroelectric and magnetic measurements show changes in ferroelectric and magnetic states close to each other (∼200 K). The magnetoelectric coefficient behavior as a function of Hbias suggests a room temperature nonlinear magnetoelectric coupling in both single-phase and Nb-doped AlFeO3-based ceramic compositions.

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